Description
Nursultan Nazarbayev, in full Nursultan Abishevich Nazarbayev, Nazarbayev also spelled Nazarbaev (born July 6, 1940, Kazakhstan, U.S.S.R.), president of Kazakhstan (from 1990), a reformist who sought regional autonomy for his Central Asian republic.
Nazarbayev was the son of Kazakh peasants. He graduated from a technical school in Dneprodzerzhinsk (now Dniprodzerzhynsk, Ukraine) in 1960, from a technical school of the Karaganda (now Qaraghandy) Metallurgical Combine in Kazakhstan (1967), and from the Higher Party School in Moscow (1976). He worked as a steelworker and engineer at the Karaganda plant off and on from 1960 to 1977. He joined the Communist Party of the Soviet Union (CPSU) in 1962 and rose through the ranks, becoming a full member of the Kazakhstan Politburo in 1979, chairman of the Kazakh Council of Ministers (1984–89), first secretary of the Kazakhstan party (1989–91), and full member of the CPSU Politburo (1990–91). In 1990 the Supreme Soviet of Kazakhstan elected Nazarbayev president of the republic.